Africa-Press – Uganda. Uganda’s women football national teams coach Sheryl Botes is full of praise for her Teen Cranes ahead of Saturday’s first round first leg encounter with Cameroon in the Fifa U-17 Women World Cup Qualifiers at St. Mary’s Stadium Kitende.
South African coach Botes loves to work with youthful girls and her search for talent took her to the Uganda Secondary School Sports Association (USSSA) Elite Games in Jinja last week.
“I was in awe of what I saw, good quality players at school level,” Botes told the media on her return to Kampala during the week.
“We took some of the players from that tournament and put them in the squad (that will face Cameroon),” she added.
Most of the training with the U-17s has been behind closed doors but Botes is looking at more than just World Cup qualification. The U-20 team was selected to take part in the March 8-23 All Africa Games in Ghana and the coach is looking to trust some of her Teen Cranes there too.
“I am looking at some of these girls that we have seen with so much talent and potential to go to the U-20s. I want to say to the (senior team) Crested Cranes that there are U-20s coming and there are 16 year olds and 15 year olds that are too good not to play there.
“We need a national team that is competitive. We cannot keep Agnes (Nabukenya) and Shadia (Babirye) behind. These girls need to be thrown in the deep end and if they need to grow, learn how to fight and if they fail to fit in, we can throw them back to the U-17s,” Botes said.
That speaks of a coach confident in the abilities of her prodigies. In 2020, Uganda was due to play Cameroon for a slot in the finals of the U-17 Women’s World Cup then but the world was hit by the Covid-19 pandemic that wiped out a lot of sports that year.
Both countries should have different squads now but the encounter will definitely have tastes of what could have been.
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